Week 25 Saturday (Year 2)

Readings: Ecclesiastes 11.9-12.8; Psalm 90; Luke 9.43b-45

There's one verse in Mark's Gospel, chapter 10, verse 32, which summarises what Luke says here, over a longer passage. The disciples were astonished, and those who followed him were afraid. The disciples are those who followed him, and those who followed him are the disciples, and they are both astonished and afraid.

There's an emotional rollercoaster which they experience in trying to stay with Jesus. One moment they're full of admiration, full of amazement, full of wonder at what he does. The next moment they're afraid, they're silent because of what he says.

They find his deeds amazing, they find his words disturbing. But Jesus says to them, these words must sink into your ears, it's a strange saying. Another translation has it, you must have them constantly in mind.

Jesus is alerting us to something we know from experience, that there are different levels of hearing. We can hear things at many different levels. Physically we might hear what a person is saying to us, but in our hearts and in our lives, somewhere deeper down, we decide we don't want to hear what we have just heard.

We don't want to allow that truth in. We choose very often not to understand. Fear of the truth, or the implications of the truth, or the demands of the truth, will often prevent us from asking more, from saying, what is it you just said? Is there more that needs to be said about what you have just said? It is a fear of the truth, a fear of the consequences and demands of the truth, which will in many circumstances, enable us to turn a deaf ear, shut down, to shut down our hearing, so that even though we hear things physically, we do not hear them in our hearts, or in our minds, or in our lives.

It seems to me that a sure sign that this is where the disciples are, in this passage of Luke, is there when we read on, next day an argument broke out among them about who was the greatest. It's a classic kind of deflection of emotional energy and attention onto something else, having decided that they do not want to hear what Jesus is saying to them, that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of men. Their energy goes elsewhere, and they start fighting with each other.

Our journey of discipleship will presumably be like that. We will move around between amazement on the one hand, fear on the other, and then confusion, as we find ourselves unable to allow the truth of Jesus' words to sink into our ears, to be constantly in our minds, to find a home in our hearts. Perfect love casts out fear, we're told in the first letter of St. John.

Perfect love casts out fear, and then we can receive the truth. When we are free from fear, we can receive the truth and allow his words to sink into our ears, into our hearts, and into our lives. Perfect love allows us to accept the consequences and the demands of the truth.

But for most of us, that's a destination yet to be attained, a goal towards which we try to move and pray that someday, with God's grace, we will be there. We try to persevere, growing in courage as we go along, allowing the words of Jesus to make their home in us. It is easy from time to time to be amazed and to wonder at his deeds.

It is much more difficult, much more disturbing, much more demanding to allow the words of Jesus to sink into our ears, to find their way into our minds and into our hearts, to find their way into our lives. It is only with the help of his grace that such a thing is possible, that we can grow into that perfect love which casts out fear and so enables us to receive and to rejoice in the truth. And to live from that truth, the truth of his words, which have come to dwell in us.

Week 25 Friday (Year 2)

Readings: Ecclesiastes 3:1-11; Psalm 144; Luke 9:18-22

As so often in St Luke's gospel Jesus is at prayer before making a key decision or asking a decisive question. Here it is the familiar question, 'who do you say that I am'? Coming as it does directly from the heart of his prayer (in solitude, with the disciples) it seems that this must also have been his prayer's content. Many human beings all over the world are probably doing this right now, praying to God about their vocation: who am I? what is it you want me to do? who is it you want me to be?

In his humanity Jesus also prays about this question. The issue had arisen already in his experience of the temptations (Luke 4): in fact those temptations can be understood as pervading the whole of his public ministry, questions about who he is and what his mission is, questions he put to his disciples, having first, presumably, put them to himself and to the Father in prayer.

He seems embarrassed by the response of Peter, rebuking the disciples and commanding them to tell this to no one. 'The Christ of God' is Peter's answer but Jesus continues by speaking about 'the Son of Man who must suffer many things, be rejected, killed and be raised'. It must be that it is a matter of the right time, or, to be more precise, of the wrong time. What is the problem? He is engaged in teaching them something very delicate as he appropriates for himself the teaching he is sharing with them. What kind of Christ is he to be? When is the right time for speaking more explicitly and more publicly about the answer that is emerging? Not now, it seems, not for the moment.

Human wisdom and prudence are often seen in good timing: what to do or say can be clear, the challenge is to find the right time, the right set of circumstances, in which to say or do it. For teaching the wisdom of the cross, the hard paradoxical wisdom of the gospel, when is the time right and when are the circumstances favourable? We might say never, it will always be challenging to teach that wisdom. Or we might say 'the fulness of time' is the right time for teaching this wisdom, a kairos moment in the life of each individual, a moment of grace and understanding, when the knowledge of the cross can be received not just as reasonable and intelligible, but as desirable and infinitely wise.

Week 25 Thursday (Year 2)

Readings: Ecclesiastes 1:2-11; Psalm 90; Luke 9:7-9

At the end of some readings from the Bible it can feel very strange to say 'this is the Word of the Lord / thanks be to God'. Today's first reading is an example, the famous 'vanity of vanities' passage at the beginning of the Book of Ecclesiastes (Qoheleth). What is the point? Where is it all going? Days come and go, months and years, there is nothing new under the sun, we wear ourselves out, have nothing to show for it, and in a hundred years time what difference will it have made?

The monastic tradition in Christianity has given us reflections on the seven or eight deadly sins or principal vices among which we find sloth or acedia, a kind of listlessness in which everything seems pointless and meaningless. Evagrius of Pontus is one of the monastic teachers who writes about these sins or vices which he calls 'thinkings', or 'thoughts'. Logismoi is his Greek term, we would perhaps use the term 'fantasies'. They refer to things we find insinuating themselves into our minds, mixtures of thought and feeling that distract, disturb, darken, and fragment. From different directions they take away our serenity and peacefulness. With acedia specifically we lose a sense of purpose and energy, things come to seem pointless.

The sun plays an important role in all this. Ecclesiastes speaks of human toil and effort under the sun. The sun rises and sets as day unendingly follows day. Is there anything new under the sun? Acedia was also called 'the noonday devil', noon being the time when the sun is at its highest and hottest, the time of day when this problem is most acute. But Evagrius says the problems start at 10.00am and goes on until 2.00pm! The monk looks out his window, wondering whether the sun is moving at all. When will it be 3.00pm? Perhaps there was food, or a break, at 3.00pm. Or perhaps it was just that the heat of the sun has eased by then.

Anybody who has lived through a Roman summer will have some idea of the effect of intense heat day after day. There is a story of a Scottish Cardinal who claimed that it was impossible to commit a sin when the scirocco was blowing in Rome, the hot wind from the Sahara, on the grounds that nobody could think straight in such conditions.

So what is the solution to acedia? It is not clear that the spiritual masters who wrote about it - Evagrius, Cassian, Gregory the Great, Isidore, Aquinas - have any easy solution. Perhaps it is enough good news to know that this human experience is recognised and acknowledged in the Bible and in Christian traditions of spirituality. Whatever its roots - physical, emotional, intellectual - it seems to be a universal and perennial human experience.

One solution is to bring ourselves, again and again, into our present reality and to remind ourselves that the life of the Spirit is flowing in us for the 'here and now', with these actual people, and through these actual responsibilities. Acedia will tell us that we would be happier if things were different (so we re-arrange the furniture in the room), or if we knew more (so we buy yet another book on the spiritual life), or if we lived with different people (so we think about living in another community or perhaps we should have married a different person), or if we lived at a different time (so we fantasise about living in other countries at other times). But our faith is incarnational, about here and now, and these people, and these responsibilities which are mine today. We are to find meaning - and a meaning deeper than all our imaginings - in the experiences that are ours today: this is what faith assures us. Sometimes we 'feel' this re-assurance, have a lively sense of it, but often we don't, in which case we keep going, placing our trust in the One in whom we believed and continuing to serve Him as best we can.

It is good to know that this experience is recognised and acknowledged in the Bible, in the liturgy of the Church and in our traditions of spirituality. Thomas Aquinas adds a thought of his own about acedia: it is called the noon-day devil, he says, because the mid-point of any work is a difficult moment. It is as if every important human undertaking will encounter a moment of 'mid-life crisis'. Is it too late to turn back? The end is not yet in sight. Was it a mistake to begin in the first place? Like Peter walking on the water we need to keep our eyes on the One who is calling us, the End of our journey. Whether we are afflicted by doubt or oppressed by acedia, keep looking to him, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, the sun of justice who assigns us our daily tasks in the service of his kingdom.

Week 25 Wednesday (Year 2)

Readings: Proverbs 30:5-9; Psalm 119; Luke 9:1-6

The readings speak of two different kinds of trust in God. The reading from Proverbs asks God to arrange the circumstances so that I will not be faced with the temptations that come from being either rich or poor. If I am rich I may forget God, if I am poor I may curse God. It is one way of trusting in God, to believe that he will arrange things so that I am protected from such temptations. If he takes care of the circumstances, I will be able to manage, I will live well.

The other kind of trust is clear in the gospel reading. The Twelve are 'entrusted' with authority and power to teach and heal. They are to be grown up children of God, responsible and taking initiatives. They are not now to be dependent on God to arrange congenial circumstances for them. Rather do they trust God to give them a share of His Spirit so that they will be able to engage appropriately with whatever circumstances they encounter.

They are to be co-workers, sharing in the Lord's ministry of teaching, healing and casting out demons. They are not guaranteed favourable circumstances. Their dependence and trust in God is deeper. It is internal rather than external, to do with what they are becoming in their hearts and minds rather than with the external situations and relationships in which they find themselves.

Saint Paul speaks very well of this second kind of trust in his letter to the Philippians: 'I have learned, in whatever state I am, to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound; in any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want. I can do all things in him who strengthens me' (4:11-13).

Week 25 Sunday (Year A)

Readings: Isaiah 55:6-9; Psalm 145; Philippians 1:20-24, 27; Matthew 20:1-16

As humanity becomes ever more sophisticated in technology, in science, in communications, and so on, it sometimes seems as if it stays fixed morally and spiritually, at an infantile stage of development. when we see the level of political debate at present, the absence of good leaders, the increasing influence of the most basic human emotions - greed, envy, fear, rivalry - and the appeal being made to them by the leaders we do have - it can seem that we are living Lord of the Flies except with computers, drones, and nuclear weapons. We have good reason to be apprehensive and fearful - which further feeds the way in which politics is being played at present.

The instinctive reaction to today's parable - that those who spent the whole day working should receive more than those who only worked the last hour, or else that these latter should receive less - comes from that base level of understanding and feeling. There is a kind of justice in it, we will feel. The landowner's decision to pay everyone the same seems like a too simplistic, a too univocally mathematical, understanding of equality. Or perhaps it is we who want to apply a too univocally mathematical an understanding - equal pay for equal work, more pay for more work, less pay for less work. How else can things be done fairly?

One difficulty with that - as the landowner points out - is that it leaves no room for generosity but the gain there is in that exclusion is that it leaves no room either for envy and so might head off at least some of the reasons why human beings are so violent. All is clear when it is a matter of Xa for X1, Xb for X2, etc. Is the landowner a patronising capitalist, wanting to show off somehow, throw his wealth around, sow division, provoke envy, keep the workers of the world divided?

How can there be a place for generosity and gift - for grace - where a certain kind of iron mathematics determines how 'equality' is to be understood? How honour diversity at the same time as respecting equality? How leave space for the requirements of fraternity alongside those of equality?

The needs of human beings are basically the same and in important ways varied. Can we imagine that the landowner is applying the criterion - known in early Christianity and in monastic communities - 'from each according to their ability, to each according to their need'? Or will such an ideal always be subverted by the baser emotions, especially envy, which will always see it as a kind of injustice, a kind of discrimination. Which it is, in favour of meeting human needs.

Putting the first reading from Isaiah 55 alongside the parable encourages us to interpret it along these lines - the landowner being 'God', his ways and thoughts not our ways and thoughts. Why be envious (angry, jealous, resentful ... sexist, racist, etc.) because God is generous (also in his creativity, spontaneity, freedom, in his delight in difference and variety and multiplicity, etc.)

The Lord is close to all who call him, the psalm says, ready to be found. But how ready are we to live in his kingdom? Is the 'first Adam' in us still so powerful - and we see it in the infantile passions that determine so much of human behaviour - that we are not even at the beginning of understanding the thoughts and ways of generosity and grace? What new way of seeing, what new way of thinking, do we need if we are to understand the economics of that kingdom, the value of each person, whether it comes to our attention in the dawning light of that kingdom's day or in the evening when the time of judgement has come nearer?

Week 25 Saturday (Year 1)

Readings: Zechariah 2.5-9, 14-15a; Jeremiah 31.10-14 ; Luke 9.43b-45

The prophets of the Restoration, after the people return from exile in Babylon, become more and more apocalyptic. What does that mean? It means their understanding of things looks now towards a future fulfilment that would be cosmic, comprehensive and definitive, at a time yet to be revealed. In the exile they had lost everything they had counted on and their return could never be simply back to the way things were before. Too much had changed in their deepest understanding of God and of their place in God's plan.

Through their experience of loss God clearly revealed himself to them as the one and only God of all creation and the one and only Lord of all history. Israel's place in God's plan is in one way relativised, but in another way revealed in its fulness, for the other nations are God's creation also and their destiny is God's concern. The first reading at Mass today is just one of the passages in the Bible which speak of many nations joining themselves to the Lord 'on that day' when 'they shall be his people and he will dwell among them'. In other words the original promise to Abraham is to be fulfilled as the nations also are gathered into the fold of God's people and so brought into the blessings of the covenant - 'I will be your and their God, and you and they will be my people'.

In the gospel reading Jesus, who for Christians inaugurates 'the day of the Lord' foretold by the prophets, warns his disciples of the crisis that will accompany that inauguration, affecting him personally and radically. There is no birth without blood, and that is what is implied in him saying to the disciples that the Son of Man - he himself, and for Israel the one who will inaugurate the cosmic fulfilment - is to be 'handed over to men'. It is to happen in the 'today' of Jesus's earthly life but in a manner no one imagined before it happened.

He had inaugurated his public ministry in the synagogue at Nazareth (Luke 4) telling the people that he had come to proclaim 'the year of the Lord's favour' and he ends his public ministry by being 'handed over to men'. He was not understood at either time though the disciples would later be brought to understand when he explained the scriptures to them, and how everything that happened to him was already foretold.

Christians live in a tension therefore. Our time of salvation is already here, today, for the promise of an eternal kingdom has been fulfilled. But it is not yet fully realised - we are already children of God, Saint John says, but what we are to be in the future has not yet been revealed. We shall be like him when we see him as he is. In the meantime we are called to continue following him in how we live, ready to take up the cross with him, whatever form it takes in the life of each of us.

No birth without blood. So we look forward to the glory and joy that is promised while paying attention to the warning of Jesus. The glory of God is revealed definitively, comprehensively and cosmically in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. There death is destroyed and eternal life triumphs. When he stretches out his arms on the cross and says 'it is consummated', the gates of the city of Zion are opened for all the nations.

Week 25 Friday (Year 1)

Readings: Haggai 1.15b-2.9; Psalm 42; Luke 9.18-22

Could it be that the most important things we learn in the course of our lives are the alphabet and how to tie our shoe laces? Long ago subsumed and hidden within all the other things we have learned since then, nevertheless all of that later learning is somehow dependent on these first two lessons: all our intellectual understanding on the alphabet, all our practical ability on how to tie laces.

The whole process of learning is wonderfully mysterious for it is difficult to see how we can learn anything new. We take things in in terms of the categories, concepts and skills we have already in place. How can they be expanded and enlarged so that we end up with categories, concepts and skills we did not have before? Is it simply a question of ever more sophisticated ways of making words and tying laces?

The people trying to understand who Jesus might be do it in terms of what they already know: he is John the Baptist, or Elijah, or another prophet come again. Even if he is a prophet we know what that means and it lessens the anxiety of having to open up to something really new. The disciples, led by Peter, seem to do a bit better: you are the Christ of God, he says, and Jesus tells them to keep this to themselves. That is curious enough, but then he endorses what Peter says by using a different set of words: the Son of Man. Not only that, but the destiny of this 'Son of Man' is one that has not figured in their alphabet up to then: although he is Christ he is to suffer greatly, be rejected, and even be killed. Well such things happen to prophets from time to time.

But finally, Jesus adds, on the third day he will be raised. And that is the one to throw the pieces in the air, confuse language and puzzle thought. 'God forbid', Peter says in Matthew and Mark, though Luke spares him that embarrassment. (We can imagine Peter cringing later in his life when he remembered that when Jesus spoke of rising from the dead his first reaction was 'God forbid it'!) Better the vale of tears we know to a new creation at that cost - and in any case what are we talking about when we talk of a new creation?

We find the same pedagogy in the first reading. Through the prophet the Lord helps the people to understand new experiences in terms of what they know well already: 'I am with you', he says, evoking the divine name given to Moses and then he makes it explicit: it is all within the pact I made with you when you came out of Egypt. So the same God, the same covenant, the same promise of presence and salvation. 'My spirit continues in your midst, have no fear'.

But then comes the moment of newness. 'In a little while' - how long might it be, God's 'little while'? - God will shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land, and all the nations. All the pieces are in the air, lost for words, puzzlement. I am with you. Same God, same spirit, same promise. Something greater yet to come - a kind of resurrection? new creation? peace, but not as the world gives?

So there is continuity and discontinuity and we can assume that it will be the same for ourselves as we are asked, individually and as a community, to learn new things, to undergo new experiences, to be brought more deeply into the mysteries of the Kingdom of God.

It was my parents who taught me how to tie my shoe laces and how to use the alphabet. Amazing to think that all subsequent knowledge and ability somehow rests on those long ago foundations. Likewise for our faith - its alphabet and its practices were first taught to me by my parents. Same God, same spirit, same promise. Different experiences, very different in many ways, with new challenges and questions. But always something greater yet to come if we can stay with Jesus, Christ of God, Son of Man and now Risen Lord. He, our Teacher and Saviour, now calls us on through the shaking of all things to a new and glorious world, his kingdom of justice, love and peace.

Week 25 Thursday (Year 1)

Readings: Haggai 1.1-8; Psalm 149; Luke 9.7-9

One thing coming through in the readings these days is how the chosen people are helped by foreigners, first Cyrus and now Darius, to return and rebuild the land, the city and the temple. They are given back to themselves through the actions of these outsiders. The great French Dominican theologian Yves Congar applied the same principle to the Church - sometimes the Church will need 'the world', an outside voice, to call it back to itself.

A recent example is the sexual abuse crisis in the Church in so many countries. This is being addressed not because of any initiative taken first from within the Church but primarily because of the work of journalists who bring the truth to light. (For as many people who might be cynical about journalists there are as many, if not more, who are now cynical about clergy.)

Another thing coming through is how a basic structure in the organization of God's people survives through all the vicissitudes they experience. This is the structure of priests, prophets and kings (or governors, commissioners, some political leadership). In difficult and confusing times it is the prophet's voice that interprets the situation, warns against the wrong path, and points out the right path. It is why we speak about the need for the prophetic voice in the Church. They are not so much people who foresee the future as they are people who are so imbued, so filled, with the Word of God that they can speak authoritatively about what is happening in the present and see what is to be done. The light of God's Word shining through them illuminates things for the people.

We have two examples today of the respect for the prophetic voice in Israel. One is Haggai who challenges the people to get on with re-building the temple. You are thinking first of your own comfort and security, he says. His job is to call them back to their fundamental relationship, with God: have you forgotten that again, so soon? What depth or meaning will your lives have if you are simply concerned about yourselves and forget the presence of God which is your real glory as a people? Your surrender to consumerism, Haggai concludes, leaves you sated and unfulfilled at the same time. Reflect carefully how things have gone for you: they should be able to work it out for themselves.

The second example is in the gospel reading where we hear about a Jewish King, Herod, who wants to see Jesus. He has heard about Jesus's preaching and actions and immediately recognises that this is a prophetic voice. What will it mean for Herod? Good news or bad? He is perplexed and anxious which is exactly how a ruler ought to feel in the presence of a prophet. Everyone knows now that Jesus is a prophet even if some of them are suggesting that he is one of the former prophets risen from the dead. We can imagine that a risen John the Baptist would be the last person Herod would want to meet.

So he wanted to see Jesus: this is how the gospel reading ends. We can put the question to ourselves: how anxious am I that the prophetic word should illuminate my life? Good news or bad? The light of truth in the first place - what will it show me about myself? - but always also the light of God's love because, as we now know so well, the Word of God is a Word that breathes Love just as it is a Word that radiates Truth. So this Prophet speaks words that are always both truthful and loving.

Jesus is priest, prophet and king, all in one. He continues to call people to follow him, to live by his Truth and to grow in his Love. Sometimes that call reaches us in ways that leave us perplexed, along roads we did not expect. That is not important. What is important is to live in the truth no matter by whom it is addressed to us, to receive God's love no matter by whom it is carried to us.

Week 25 Wednesday (Year 1)

Readings: Ezra 9.5-9; Tobit 13; Luke 9.1-6

The interface between the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of the world is always complicated. They are inevitably intertwined, sometimes in ways that are helpful to the kingdom of God and sometimes the opposite.

The issue is clear in the readings today. The political situation in the Middle East changes with the rise of Cyrus, King of Persia. Where before the situation led to the loss of the promised land, the city of Jerusalem  and the temple, now the wind blows in a different direction. King Cyrus enables and encourages the return of the people to the land and to the city along with the rebuilding of the temple. In this way the worldly power of the day may be regarded as helpful to the kingdom of God.

Of course they remain distinct realities, easy enough to see when it is 'a foreign political power' that rules and more difficult to see when the 'secular' power is home grown: then the danger is of all kinds of compromise and confusion even to the point of establishing a 'theocracy', an identification of the two kingdoms. 

The people of God saw that the loss and exile they experienced was the inevitable outcome of the corruption that had spread among them. It was not so much that God had to take action as it was simply a question of allowing that corruption to have its full effect, imploding things from within. Once again it is clear that the two realms remain distinct even when they are intricately interwoven - political and military success and the growth of the kingdom of God are two distinct realities. They do not necessarily go together and they operate, in fact, by very different criteria as to what counts as success and what as failure.

So in the gospel Jesus speaks of power and strength as he shares his authority and his mission with the disciples. It is a power over demons and a strength to heal. They are sent to preach and to heal and to exorcise with that power. They are to live simply, offer peace, and when rejected do nothing more than shake the dust off their feet.

The kingdom of God, inaugurated by Christ is about announcing the good news and working miracles. The political powers of the world have always been interested in the community that has been entrusted with that mission. Sometimes they oppress and persecute its members, and sometimes they seek to exploit its membership and its resources for their own ends. Those who regard themselves as belonging first to the kingdom of God - 'seek first the kingdom of God' - must also always align themselves within worldly politics - the New Testament teaches them not to avoid or ignore such 'civic' responsibilities. But the temptations of worldly power have sometimes - often? - overshadowed the preaching of Christ's kingdom, confusing and distorting the distinctions and the lines of interaction between the two realms.

There is no easy resolution and so there have been many and varied forms of this relationship. The task remains for each generation and each community to interpret the signs of its own time and place. If we are to be faithful here and now to the power and strength of Christ's kingdom, how are we to dispose ourselves in relation to the worldly powers within whose ambience we find ourselves living?

Sometimes it is foreigners and outsiders who save believers from themselves and call them back to their true selves. Sometimes the power of Christ is understood and welcomed, sometimes it is exploited for purposes other than its own, sometimes it is understood and feared and rejected. The servants of the kingdom are to remain peaceful in all circumstances, as Christian martyrs have always been. They are to shake the dust off their feet which may mean seeking other places in which to preach the good news or staying where they are and waiting for a more favourable time, a new kairos moment in which the kingdom can once again show itself in its true form.

Week 25 Monday (Year 1)

Readings: Ezra 1.1-6; Psalm 125/126; Luke 8.16-18

The Irish comedian Dave Allen gave a lot of attention to religion, in particular to Catholicism, and some of his sketches are still among the funniest on the topic. In considering religion, his attitude seems to have been more puzzlement and curiosity than anger. And he ended each of his performances with the words 'may your god go with you'.

Dave Allen would be amused, I presume, to be compared with Cyrus, King of Persia, who also encouraged the Jews of his empire to return to their homes in Jerusalem, 'their god going with them'. We read about it in the first reading today, where there is an interesting combination of the universal with the particular.

Cyrus had whatever religion he had but he becomes the instrument of the Lord, the God of Israel, in fulfilling words spoken through the Hebrew prophet Jeremiah. Within a few lines we see the Lord described as 'the God of heaven', for whom a house is to be re-built in Jerusalem, and as the God of a particular people, now free to return with 'their god' after their years in exile. All the people of Cyrus's empire, whatever their race or creed, are instructed to help the Jewish people to return and to re-establish themselves in Jerusalem.

One of the great achievements of the prophets like Jeremiah was to teach the people that the Lord - their own local, tribal, God - was not just that but was also God of heaven and earth, the God of all peoples, the Creator of all and the Redeemer of all. And yet God's purpose in the world and in the world's history would still be 'localised', embodied in a particular people worshipping in a particular temple in a particular city. It is as if the returning people are a sacrament, a sign, of the universal presence and purpose of God, the city of Jerusalem itself sacramental and likewise the temple and the rituals enacted therein. It is already 'the Church of God', therefore, this particular people God chose as his own but for a purpose that includes all humanity.

The city and its temple are set on that hill to be lights shining for all who come within their radiance. The mystery hidden from before all the ages - this is how Saint Paul will speak of it - is being revealed definitively and fully through the person, words and actions of Jesus Christ. All will become visible, all will be known: this is how Jesus speaks in today's gospel.

But with this warning: be careful how you hear this, how you understand your place in the story. The particularity can block the universality just as the universality can smother the particularity. But if you 'have' this in the right way - that is in the way of 'not having', since all is God's - then you will have even more, you will see even more. If you fail to 'have' this in the correct way then your hold on it will dissolve completely.

So remember the promise you have received and the particular people with whom you are to live towards this promise. But remember also that it is a promise to be fulfilled not just for that particular people but for all people, for Cyrus, king of Persia, as much as for Jeremiah, prophet in Israel, or for Paul, apostle of the Gentiles. Fulfilled also we hope, by God's grace, for Dave Allen: may God surprise him by welcoming him into the Jerusalem above which is our mother.

Week 25 Sunday (Year C)

Readings: Amos 8:4-7; Psalm 113; 1 Timothy 2:1-8; Luke 16:1-13

It is one of the strangest of the parables. Jesus recommends the shrewdness of a dishonest steward. You must at least be as prudent as this man was, quick as he was, alert and attentive to what is happening. People put their cleverness and gifts at the service of shady deals. You must try to use your cleverness and gifts in the pursuit of things that have eternal value.

There is often 'honour among thieves', as the old saying has it. It can be taken to mean that there is some minimal integrity in everybody. It may be a loyalty to people involved in the same kind of wickedness but at least it is loyalty, an experience of friendship. It may be the acceptance of certain limits to unethical behaviour and a determination that those limits not be crossed even while persisting in that behaviour. We can take the parable to be saying 'find the bit of integrity there is in you, find the place where you have some kind of wisdom and prudence, find where you are committed to some truth no matter how banal or ordinary'. You can begin with that integrity, prudence, or truth, and you can build something more substantial on that foundation. If there is a basis for trust and confidence, even if for the moment it is supporting things that are not good, then there is at least the possibility that you will find your way to being entrusted with genuine riches.

Another strange statement is this one: 'if you are not trustworthy with what belongs to another, who will give you what is yours?' It seems like it is the wrong way round. Surely it is more logical to say 'if you are not trustworthy with what is yours, who will give you what belongs to another'. It invites us to think about how we are alienated from ourselves in the ways in which we treat other people, their interests and their goods. Alienation is an important term in Marx's analysis of social and economic realities. Augustine had used the term long before to talk about the spiritual disorientation and loss that comes with any sin, not just the structural ones Marx was interested in.

We are in exile from ourselves, seeking to find ourselves in the things that belong to others, but realising that we are not fully trustworthy with those. Inevitably, it seems, we end up using others for our pleasure, to serve our interests, to strengthen the false persona we try to present to the world. How are we to get back to ourselves, to the base of integrity on which something can be built? How, like the prodigal son last week, are we to 'come to our senses'? How are we to find ourselves again so as to focus our energies, our prudence, our action, our devotion, on things that are worthwhile?

Besides the unjust dealings referred to in the passage from Amos and in the gospel reading, there is another exchange referred to in today's readings. This is the price paid by Christ Jesus when he gave himself as a ransom for all (second reading). This is the one who is most himself, fully integrated, fully at home. From that base of his own identity and integrity as the Son of the Father he can act for the salvation of the whole world. God wants everybody to be saved, we are told today, and to come to the knowledge of the truth. Everybody knows some truth and from there the road to Truth can open up, the Truth that there is one God and one mediator between God and human beings, Jesus the Christ.

We easily get lost in compromises, mediocrity, betrayals and confusions. The unjust steward is alert and watchful, a man of vision and creativity. We are called to be like that, except that we place those gifts and virtues at the service of the kingdom. There is always some point at which we can begin, some honour we show, some truth we know, some love we share. Let us make friends with those things and see our heart's desire blossom into something of eternal value.

Week 25 Sunday (Year B)

Readings: Wisdom 2.12,17-20; Psalm 53/54; James 3.16-4.3; Mark 9.30-37

There is something very real about the diagnosis of human behaviour that we find in the Letter of James. Everything originates within yourselves, he says. All conflict and fighting have their origins in your feelings of jealousy and ambition. Feelings lead to thoughts lead to actions lead to consequences in the world.

We see this also in the first reading, from the Book of Wisdom. The good person, simply by being good, provokes the envy and even hatred of others. They take his or her goodness as some kind of judgement or criticism of themselves. Even your prayers can be vitiated by your desires, James says, one of the most disturbing statements in the whole of the New Testament. We might have thought that our prayers at least could be kept untouched by our baser instincts, but James says no: we can even try to manipulate God, try to put him at the service of our jealousy and ambition.

The same problem is there in the gospel reading, so all three readings harmonise quite powerfully today. Jesus is trying to teach his disciples about the paschal mystery, his suffering, death and resurrection which are to come, and they fail to understand and are afraid to ask more about it. Instead they amuse themselves by considering which of them is the greatest. Even in the presence of Wisdom itself, human self-centredness and sad anxiety distract and distort.

How are we to fight against such distraction and distortion, against the ambition to be greater than others and the jealousy we feel where the goodness of another is taken as criticism or judgement on me?

The response is phrased in one way by James, in another way by Jesus. The antidote, says James, is the wisdom that comes down from above, because it is pure, makes for peace, is kindly and considerate, is full of compassion, and shows itself in doing good. There is no trace of partiality or hypocrisy in it. It is a portrait of the good person, echoing what we find in Wisdom 2, the beatitudes in Matthew 5, and the hymn to love in 1 Corinthians 13.

It is a portrait therefore of Jesus himself. He is the Wisdom come down from above and his antidote to the distraction of the disciples in today's gospel passage is to present them with a little child. Here is the cure for your ambition and jealousy, he says: seek to be as insignificant and as powerless as the child. Seek to be the least, not the greatest, in order to be at the service of all. Purity, peace-making, kindness and consideration, compassion and doing good, justice and honesty: Wisdom 2, Matthew 5, James 3-4, 1 Corinthians 13 - it is the life of the beatitudes, the still more excellent way, the lifestyle of Jesus, his 'spirituality', life according to the Spirit.

The likelihood is, of course, that we will continue to find it difficult to understand because it is so contrary to how 'healthy, mature and successful living' are understood in the culture within which we live. In place of confidence, assertion, success and self-promotion, we are to seek simply to serve others, to be the least among them. Like the disciples we might be afraid to ask more because it will reveal not just our failure to understand but also our moral and spiritual poverty, the hold that jealousy and ambition still have over us. Can I even claim that my prayers are free of these things, that at least the desires I express in prayer are rightly ordered?

The Wisdom that comes down from above is incarnate in Jesus, is contained in his teaching, and is accessible to those who live by his Spirit. And it is found only along the way of the Cross. Only through the foolishness and weakness of that 'little way' can we come to possess true wisdom and so have our hearts set right.